c4countdown

Jon Corby

Corby wrote:
Martin Gardner wrote:I already have a 3 hour exam in April, I don't want it to be 3 hrs 45 minutes !

Martin
Try not to gouge your left eye out then.

FFS, as you can see this message was originally posted before Friday's show.

What are the f***ing chances of that, eh?

Jon Corby

Jon Corby

Martin Gardner wrote:I already have a 3 hour exam in April, I don't want it to be 3 hrs 45 minutes !

Martin

Try not to gouge your left eye out then.

Jon Corby

Chris Corby wrote:I would never make a cup of tea

Me neither, that's what our women for - right Dad?

Jon Corby

Michael Wallace wrote:ooh, since I'm disabled I get 25% extra time in my exams - can I have an extra 7.5 seconds in every round please?

What is your disability Michael?

Jon Corby

Charlie Reams wrote:Richard just hit me with a private torrent of abuse and, as you can see, has deleted all of his posts. I guess that means I win the argument?

Please post it

Jon Corby

Where have all his posts gone?

Have the FBI got to him and silenced him?

I'm scared.

Jon Corby

What I find humorous is that NASA, with all its space experts and money and that (plus clearly having bugger all else to do since nothing can leave the earth), can't come up with a convincing fake that a lonely teenage virgin can't easily pick apart in seconds.

Jon Corby

This site should explain everything about the supposed moon landings.

Jon Corby

Conor sniggering at ERECTION during his match with Paul is one of my all-time favourite TV moments

Conor also got WOOD in one of his CoC games...

Jon Corby

Charlie Reams wrote:Yes. Anyone else?

Cool, am I a Master or do I have to play in the retards section?

Jon Corby

Gevin-Gavin wrote:This is a brilliant read. Keep it going.

I agree

Jon Corby

What is this? Can I play please?

Jon Corby

Ewww, ectoplasm.

Jon Corby

I'd like to make it clear at this point that Conor certainly does NOT have any erection problems.

Jon Corby

Christine Armstrong would've knocked me out of the finals had she not made a very uncharacteristic miscalculation in the final numbers game as well.

Jon Corby

Jon Corby

Dunno what you're on about in particular, but she looked fantastic today

Jon Corby

Matthew Green wrote:Incidentally, thats now 2 contestants this series I would gladly sleep with, probably more than in the other 57 series put together.

Jesus, can we give this "David O'Donnell love-in" a rest now please? It's getting kinda tedious.

Jon Corby

Craig Beevers wrote:800, meh.

Yeah, 850 is where it's at!

That's what you meant, right Craig?

Jon Corby

I also thought he was shit. He missed several easy nines, plus he only got that conundrum today because his opponent virtually told him what it was. While 880 is a fairly good score, it will surely haunt David that he could have got much higher just by being a bit better. I wouldn't be surprised if ...

Jon Corby

Rats, I really thought I had it there

Jon Corby

Ah, it's me isn't it? It's that one isn't it, where you say "you're driving a bus", and then do all that other crazy shit, and then ask the driver's name, and you're supposed to be all like "wtf?!!1 the driver's name? but what about all the people getting on and off and that??!!"...

Jon Corby

It's almost as annoying as his constant okey-dokey which makes me want to throw up, he says it that often. When he first came on I started posting an okey-dokey count every Thursday but I gave up after a few weeks because it was getting silly. It baffles me why a supposedly accomplished and profess...

Jon Corby

Conor wrote:I hope it's PM, I usually cancel my other arrangements to browse the wiki between 3-4am.

Jon Corby

I also thank you for your patience Paul

Good thread, it has been very interesting, and I've probably learnt something... I think...

Jon Corby

Here's a link to the legendary (to mathematical puzzle solvers at least) John Scholes's discussion of this problem, which I think you'll be able to follow with A-level stats, and will hopefully convince you that I'm not making it all up, even if it's only because you're hearing the same thing from ...

Jon Corby

To answer Mr Corby, I think Paul was roughly right in saying that no advanced knowledge is needed to devise the solution. The intuition is that the probability of the number falling within some range is a normal finite number between 0 and 1, even though the chance of it being any particular value ...

Jon Corby

Post all your spoilers here!

David has told me that there won't be any though, because he reckons he scores a 100% game today. Let's see if he's right!

Jon Corby

Surely the whole essence of the original problem was that the numbers were selected randomly from a boundless selection. If there is some sort of probability distribution it's a different matter altogether. Quite (I think). There was no mention of probability distributions in the first post, just t...

Jon Corby

They probably protect you from infinitesimals at A-level. Imagine throwing a (perfectly sharp) dart at a dart board. The probability of hitting the dart board is 1, yet the probability of hitting any given point on it is infinitely small. This isn't a contradiction at all, it's just that an infinit...

Jon Corby

Jon, I think your second objection is wrong for quite a subtle reason. First of all, I don't agree that you can just write infinity or -infinity on a piece of paper, as these are not numbers in the same sense that things like 12, -76234.34234 are. By the rules of the game, a finite number will alwa...

Jon Corby

I actually warmed to Jeremy Beadle the older he got and thought he was a good guest on Countdown. THE SUN newspaper has given us many memorable headlines over the years, being both funny and clever, but to show a picture of a man who has died prematurely with a jokey picture of him dressed in a pol...

Jon Corby

I am afraid I did lean over to tell Hazel about adding the -er :oops: Does that officially make me a git? In today's game I gave CABINETS as opposed to BASCINET once I heard his word.In my defence though he did say to me "hey Paddy, what's your name?" So his card was marked after that!! :...

Jon Corby

Except that this really isn't how you calculate x. Fair enough - I think this may actually help me on my second point though (with regards to altering one of the numbers to either - or + infinity, as appropriate). Note that this can all be done entirely independently of you choosing your number and...

Jon Corby

Right, I've thought about this and it is right. Sorry Paul for doubting you. To explain in my own words: C1 os the number on the first card and C2 the number on the second. We have four possibilities: C1 and C2 are both higher than x - 50/50 chance of winning C1 and C2 are both lower than x - 50/50...

Jon Corby

Lol, I lied Paul, that wasn't my final post at all. I'm still not happy here! I've just thought of another way of approaching this, which could well be flawed, as it includes some kind of interference. I don't think it messes it up, but I know how careful you have to be when you do stuff like this. ...

Jon Corby

Probably my final word on this is particular question is to query the assertion that this strategy guarantees me to be ahead in the long run, playing the game as described in Paul's original post. Our advantage is based entirely on the probability of our number being between the two numbers written ...

Jon Corby

This thread again?
This thread again?
This thread again?

(Sorry)

Jon Corby

Nah, go for it if you have any more! (Though maybe give me a day or so to rest up...) Probability puzzles are ace, I love stuff like this! I can't believe I haven't come across this one before actually, it's a beaut. I put it to some of the guys at work this morning, and Ben's answer was posted just...

Jon Corby

Julian wrote:Ah right. I seem to be good at misinterpreting your posts Jon don't I? Oh well...

Heh, yeah, I had noticed that theme developing too!

It's not just you mate, if it makes you feel any better. I was actually called an "unfunny bigoted twat" by somebody on the mailing list once

Jon Corby

Cheers Paul, I don't think you've really covered anything there that I wasn't already thinking, but thanks for taking the time ;) I understand the formula - I mean, it's ludicrously simple really - and I certainly can't see any flaws in it at the moment, but my intuition is still nagging at me. I co...

Jon Corby

Another nine missed: Corby's right, I suck. :lol: That was meant to be your cue to mention the raping you gave me in our online game last night. Damn your modesty, you've made me look bad in all kinds of ways there. ;) Awesome game again today mate, but I reckon you must feel kinda embarrassed when...

Jon Corby

Corby I detect a bit of sarcasm from you - of course I'm not saying everybody should make an individual post every time they miss a maximum in every game Lol, no I was being silly, but not in that way. I was trying to imply that I never ever miss any maxima, hence why you won't have seen any such p...

Jon Corby

Interesting... so if we say x = [probability of our number being between the two], our probability of winning = x + 0.5 * (1-x). Which is always higher than 0.5. Hmm... okay, I had a few hours to think about this while driving to/from my son's football training, and obviously then standing outside ...

Jon Corby

Pick a number and then if the first number revealed is bigger than that number, say the second one is smaller and vice versa. If the two numbers are either both bigger or both smaller than the number you've picked, then there's a 50/50 you've won, if it's in the middle, then you've definitely won. ...

Jon Corby

Post them all here!

There's bound to be loads, because David is rubbish.

Jon Corby

Just while I am that point has anyone noticed that when they rely on techniques for finding words their ability to spot pure (un-inflected) words goes downhill? Totally agree mate. I spend so much time now looking for patterns, looking for words that I know I can add other stuff to, etc etc, that I...

Jon Corby

I didn't read through the whole page, but it seems like a completely different problem to mine. Looks interesting though! Your strategy should clearly work for that "two envelopes" problem as well though (it matters not a jot that one number happens to be the double of the other presumabl...

Jon Corby

I can't escape that it's 50/50

I'm dumb.

My strategy is therefore to "think positive", much like the audience do on Deal Or No Deal. That always seems to work for them. Except when it doesn't.

Jon Corby

the frivolous law of large numbers states that most numbers are very very large - surely that doesn't count as advanced mathematics? :P Haha, I've never heard that expression before. I have to admit that after you said that I spent 5 minutes feeling embarrassed because I couldn't figure out how to ...

Jon Corby

Paul Howe wrote:Furthermore, I am not choosing the numbers to counter my opponent's strategy, they're just random picks.

Could you counter the strategy then, by not picking truly randomly?

Jon Corby

edit: indeed, now I reread the problem, it could be a trick question - you could always choose two numbers the same, and we are left with no option but to lose (but that seems like a rather unlikely solution!) Nah, it's us - the guesser - who can adopt the strategy to guarantee profit, not the pers...

Jon Corby

Right, I've slept on this and given it more thought and pretty much drawn a blank... I started to think about Benford's Law and wondered if I could use this at all. I don't believe I can, but this then led me to something else - you state that I can adopt a strategy which guarantees, in the long run...

Jon Corby

Thanks Paul. I'm going to have a really good think about this before I look back in this thread again, because I don't want to see anyone else's answer. At the moment I'm completely stuck that it will always be a complete 50/50 guess..... can't get my brain to escape this at the moment. Nice puzzle!

Jon Corby

Hmm... interesting.

Can I ask a really retarded question though - when you say "larger or smaller" do you just mean higher/lower - is -6 larger than -1, or larger than 1...?

(That looks really dumb but hopefully you'll get what I mean)

Jon Corby

But I think there is an important point to be made here (I think Damian once alluded to this as well): on this forum, and on the two or three mailing lists which preceded it, people have very rarely admitted when they DON'T get a word or numbers solution, though they're very happy to tell everyone ...

Jon Corby

David O'Donnell wrote:I think we decided that it probably wouldn't be allowed and John Corby's program and Charlie Ream's seem to concur.

I erred on the side of caution with most mass nouns, so that doesn't really mean anything...

Why are you never on msn anymore Dhahvhihd?

Jon Corby

Rats, you're all too clever.

Jon Corby

"Take a Deal" (also known as "Monty Hall") was mentioned in the Mathmo test. The traditional game goes thus: There are three doors: A, B & C. Behind only one of these doors is the star prize - the car, behind the other two doors - nothing. You select a door (let's say A), and...

Search found 6464 matches